Junior doctors will go on strike for five days in July in a move that is thought to be the longest period of industrial action seen in the NHS.
The BMA said the five-day walk out will start at 7am on Thursday 13 July and continue until 18 July.
It follows a recent BMA survey that showed junior doctors were being inundated by more offers from overseas recruiters in the last four months than ever before.
In the same survey, 82% of junior doctors said they had found their patients supportive of the strikes.
NHS survival in doubt
Earlier this month the BMA reported that two-thirds of junior doctors do not think the NHS will survive the next decade.
And a ‘disturbing’ 53% of junior doctors are thinking about or making plans to leave the NHS.
The GMC has also called on the Government and NHS to take ‘urgent action’ to break the ‘vicious cycle’ of unmanageable workloads, dissatisfaction and burnout that is causing doctors to quit.
It comes less than a week since the last round of strikes had finished, but the BMA said there had been no word from the Government about reopening negotiations since talks collapsed.
Announcing the latest action, BMA junior doctors committee co-chairs Dr Robert Laurenson and Dr Vivek Trivedi said: ‘The NHS is one of this country’s proudest achievements and it is shameful that we have a Government seemingly content to let it decline to the point of collapse with decades of real-terms pay cuts to doctors driving them away.’
Junior doctors find patients supportive
The co-chairs added that neglect of the NHS workforce had led to 7.4 million people on waiting lists, 8,500 unfilled doctors’ posts in hospitals, ‘and doctors who can barely walk down the road without a foreign government tempting them to leave an NHS where they are paid £14 per hour for a country which will pay them properly’.
They continued: ‘As their refusal to even discuss pay restoration leads to continued disruption to the health service, more than four-fifths of junior doctors report finding their patients supportive – they understand the value of a fully staffed and resourced NHS.
‘We are announcing the longest single walkout by doctors in the NHS’s history – but this is not a record that needs to go into the history books. Even now the Government can avert our action by coming to the table with a credible offer on pay restoration.’
A DHSC spokesperson said: ‘It is hugely disappointing the BMA Junior Doctors Committee has declared further strike action in July. These five days will be hugely disruptive for patients and put pressure on other NHS staff.
‘The Government presented an opening offer and there were active discussions ongoing about a range of pay and non-pay measures to improve the working lives of junior doctors. However, the Junior Doctors Committee turned their back on negotiations by announcing further strikes.
‘The Government has been clear that strikes must be paused while talks take place, and we remain ready to continue talking at any point if strikes are called off and the Junior Doctors Committee show willingness to move significantly from their unreasonable pay demands.’
A version of this story was originally published by our sister publication Pulse.
